That anyone would attempt to use California as an argument AGAINST Democracy speaks volumes for the bizarre and distorted way in which anti-democrats view the world.

Mark Leonard might be interested to know that California introduced the right of initiative-and-referendum in 1911 to address the endemic corruption of "elective" government. Since then California has become one of the most prosperous and progressive economies in the history of the world! It is the very epicentre of the technological revolution which is now re-shaping the world.

To the extent that California has had problems of governance, these are largely due to its having to operate under the decidely non-democratic US federal Constitution. It cannot, for example, control the rate at which people flow into the state (either from other US states or from overseas) and has therefore faced a problem of providing infrastructure and services to those who have flocked to its prosperity.

But the greatest argument in favour of California's (partial) democracy is much simpler: the People of California demonstrably prefer it over the corrupt system of elective government!!

As with all genuinely democratic government it is a straightforward exercise to call a referendum and vote for democratic rights to be abolished. And yet the People never do. In California there have been three such attempts over the decades and all of them either failed at the ballot box or were withdrawn in the face of imminent defeat.

Genuine democracy provides ongoing demonstration of popular consent in a way which the corrupt system of elective government never can. Whenever - by accident of history - people have been given an opportunity to adopt they almost invariably have done so. (In the very few instances where it has been rejected, some were due to the fact that threshold had been set very high and voters believed - mistakenly - that by rejecting it they would be offered an even more democratic version.)

In light of the overwhelming evidence the Governed prefer to be governed under Democracy, where does Mark Leonard get his "Charter from Heaven" to dictate that they should be ruled by elitist elective government instead??

Welcome amid the sighted. Do you got a retina transplant?
EU is ungoverned (“ungoverned”, not “ungovernable”) from its very beginning, thanks to the Maastricht treaty, who replaced government with governance. The rule of rules, enough with politics! “Here we work, we don't make politics!” was the fascists motto - you know.
Then they introduced the single currency. What a wonderful idea! For the best of your comfort you can now trade and travel all across the world (sorry, Europe. Er... sorry, EU. No, sorry, euro area) without the hassle of any money change! What a progress! What a Shumpeterian revolution!
The consequences of this governance, thus lack of government, started becoming stunningly evident about ten years ago, after the Leman-Brothers Affair - you know.
What become also evident was the circumstance that a majority of angry citizens of UE countries was growing. You only had to get a glance to the trends in Eurobarometer. Angry for what? Because they perceived that their opinion (and vote) was irrelevant. "But no! They are angry because of migrants! Because they are racists, xenophobes, prone to eat children".
And the Brexit referendum it's not the first.
Irish people voted three times about Maastricht, The first two, they said “no”. The third one, finally, they said “yes”. Ok! No need for further referenda.
Then French and Holland voted "no" to TCE. "Don't worry! TCE is over!" Then its content was placed into the Lisbona Treaty.
Who made such a mess? The persons who belongs to the European Council, i.e. the same political class of every single country! Always the same persons, always them! But this time hided behind European Commission, European Parliament (which is a Parliament like Mars is a fruit) and so on. "No need of some Dux, Füher, as in the past. No need to eliminate elections! We made have made progress a lot! We are smart!"
Brexit is only the last outcome of a long lasting process: it is the people's reaction to this fascist regime based on a new motto: "vote, vote, until you vote the way we like. And those who don't vote so, are illiterates, rightists, nationalist, racist, fascist (!!!!) xenophobes, short sighted".
What's the reaction of the Petty Bourgeoisie who lives around the City to the outcomes of Brexit referendum? "We ought to vote again! We can't accept this vote, because for the sake of democracy people has to vote the way I like! "
"Do you understand, my Ballillas? This is the problem with democracy: everyone can vote!"
“Decisions must be kept safe from elections!” [Mario Monti, the italian UE's viceroy, 2011].

The decision of the European elites to go ahead with the Lisbon Treaty is an indication of the failure of these elites to ground their diplomatic actions in democratic legitimacy. What basis did the elites have for going ahead with the legal engineering involved in the Lisbon Treaty, after two EU founding members rejected the Constitution of Europe in referendums, even though two other member states had passed the Constitution in referendums? Why are they now surprised that the deliberate efforts to design a Treaty that would not have to be put to popular votes (except in the Republic of Ireland) rebounds on their conception of the European project? If ever there was a clear signal that these activists had lost touch with those from whom they draw their legitimacy, this was it. Yet it was not only ignored. With the Lisbon Treaty, the diplomatic mode rode rough-shod over the validly expressed resistance to that form of advancing the European project. It is way past time that the European elites looked again at the model that dominates their conception of ever closer union. Are they are open enough to search for a new paradigm as opposed to finding ways of trying to squeeze more into a paradigm the legitimacy of which is increasingly rejected? They could start by looking at that deeply divided country with a weak centre and strong sub-national units eg. Switzerland. It has strong direct democracy at federal and cantonal levels. It also has checks and balances on that direct democracy in that the legislature can make counter-proposals to those put forward by the initiative. This means that Swiss-style direct democracy is complementary to representative democracy from which the diplomats draw their legitimacy. From memory, there have about 600 referendums at federal lelvel in Switzerland since 1848. Of these, about one-third have resulted from the use of the initiative. Yet less that 20 have been passed by referendum ie. less than 5% percent of all federal referendums held. Unlike California, this suggests that Swiss use of direct democracy at least facilitates, if not actively encourages, the mutual education of the democratic process. This is needed to ensure that the activists do not go too far ahead of or even lack behind, those from whom the activists derive their legitimacy. Harking back to the unmediated activism shown in the Lisbon Treaty will not advance the European project. If you want to change the results, you have to change the approach to less legalism. IMO, Valery Giscard d'Estaing suggested as much (in an article in Le Monde, if I remember correctly) in the aftermath of two EU founder members decision not to legitimize the Constitution for Europe.

When opponents of genuine democracy use the term "representative" in relation to non-democratic "elective" government, they assault their readers' intelligence with a "semantic fallacy". A semantic fallacy is a rhetorical trick which involves taking a word which has a well known meaning in one context - usually a meaning with a strong emotional content - and using it in another context in which that meaning cannot apply, or can be applied only by creating a new (and tautological) definition.

Like most rhetoric, its purpose to substitute reasoned logical argument with an appeal to emotion (which ironically what Mark Leonard purports to oppose).

Let’s consider the various non-political meanings of “representative”.

First, there is statistical representativeness.

Statistical representativeness occurs when a sample is drawn from a population and the sample is required to have the same proportions as that population for some parameters which are regarded as important. For example, it may be thought important to have the same proportions by age, or by sex, or by religion, or by income, or by weight, or by ethnic origin, or educational qualifications, or by the presence of some gene, or by place or residence, or by number of children, and so on, and so on.

If one wanted statistical representation of this type, it would be better to choose “representatives” randomly, by lottery.

Elected politicians are clearly not statistically representative of the population a whole. For a start, they are all politicians!! As discussed by Nobel laureate James Buchanan (and co-author Geoffrey Brennan, in “The Reason of Rules”), the very process of elective government adversely selects political agents who place a very high value on the possession of power over other people. In other words it adversely selects megalomaniacs.

Elected politicians are statistically unrepresentative in all sorts of other ways as well. They tend, for example, to be more gregarious than the general population. But it is not necessary to go through all the ways in which they are statistically unrepresentative. The mere fact that they are elected politicians destroys the possibility of statistical representation.

Secondly, “representation” may take the meaning of individual agency. For example, a barrister “represents” his or her client in court the following sense: we expect that the barrister will put forward the same arguments that the client would, assuming that the client had sufficient legal skill and was sufficiently articulate. The barristers acts as if her or she were the client.

But that form of “representation” cannot possibly apply in politics. It cannot apply even in principle. Why? Because in politics there is more than one client, and the wishes of the clients clearly conflict. Which “client” is the political “representative” going to represent?

The absurdity of political representation of this type is vividly illustrated by imagining oneself arriving at court one morning to find that your barrister was “representing” not only you but your opponent also, and the state, and anyone else who might claim an interest in your case!!

In such cases, the agent is not acting as a representative but as an arbiter or ruler.

Thirdly, there is the concept of “representation” that involves delegation: an individual or a group appointing an agent to act on their behalf. Typically they will set out the terms of the agency. They will give the agent certain latitude but require other matters to be referred back to themselves for direct decision.

Once again, however, that meaning of “representation” cannot apply because in most countries the People have never been asked whether they wish the politicians to act on their behalf, or on what terms. They have never been given a choice between direct democracy and elective government.

In most countries the People have simply been told that the politicians will enjoy a monopoly on legislative and executive power, and asked which team of politicians they would prefer to exercise that monopoly.

Had the People ever been given an opportunity to choose between direct democracy and elective government, then one might say that those who chose elective government had chosen to be “represented”. But the politicians (adversely selected politicians!!) have always been very, very careful never to offer that choice. (Even if they had offered it sometime in the distant past, it would apply only to those who voted on it at the time and not to their distant descendants.)

Nor may such a delegation be inferred from the People’s strategy of sullen acquiescence. The aggregate preference of a group can be inferred thus only if it is possible to show that they are not operating under conditions of Prisoners’ Dilemma which in turn would require a referendum of the type described in the preceding paragraph.

So where does that leave us?

We can say that elective government is “representative” only if we introduce yet another meaning of “representative”, namely “the thing that elective government is”.

Bu that is a pointless tautology: “elective government is ‘representative’ because ‘representative’ is defined to mean elective government”.

One could just as easily call it “wise” government or “yellow” government and add a corresponding entry to each of those words in the dictionary.

If you really want to know what form of government the People want, there is an easy way to find out. Ask them! Directly. In a referendum:

“Do you want a review of the system of government, with the details of review to be determined by a subsequent series of initiatives and referendums?”

Perhaps The People do like being ruled by megalomaniacal politicians. If so they would vote “No” in any such referendum.

However, we know from the historical record that:

a) in most jurisdictions the People have never been offered such a choice;

b) where people have been offered such a choice they almost invariably choose genuine (direct) democracy to the greatest extent made available to them; and

c) where they enjoy such democratic rights they never vote to abolish them, even though it is a straightforward exercise to call a referendum for that purpose. In fact, in California (a state which adopted initiative-and-referendum in 1909 and since become one of the most prosperous and progressive economies in the history of the world) there have been three such attempts, all of which failed or withdrawn in the face of imminent defeat.

All of which is rather damning evidence against so-called “representative” government. And it invites us to ask where Mr Leonard acquired his “Monopoly on Wisdom” in this matter, when he was granted (to borrow John Locke’s delightful phrase) a “Charter from Heaven” to decide these matters on behalf of everybody else!

Rather than telling The People how they ought to be represented, why not try asking them how – or if – they want to be represented.

In reply to Curtis Carpenter, I won't repeat it all in detail here but the comments under Kenneth Rogoff's column discuss how Democracy is the unique mathematical solution to the problem of CHOOSING a system of government (whatever that system of government might be). It is the eigensolution to preference aggregation in the absence of (logically indefensible) a priori privileging.

To begin with, insofar as it relates to choosing an aggregation device (for example, a system of government) the reference to John Adams is a fallacy of argumentum ad verecundiam. Unless it can be demonstrated that John Adams had a "Monopoly on Wisdom" or a "Charter from Heaven" to decide the issue (i.e. an a priori privileged preference) then his views are interesting but not conclusive.

Specifically, Person X may agree totally with John Adams's view and support some system of elective government. But Person Y may be unconvinced by John Adams and support a different system. John Adams's opinion provides us with no insight into how to aggregate the conflicting preferences of Person X and Person Y on the matter of how to aggregate preferences.

This line of argument may be applied to all persons and all arguments: there is no way of identifying an a priori privileged view on what the system ought to be.

In the absence of any a priori privileged preference, the only solution to aggregating {preferences on the matter of how to aggregate preferences} is to use a non-privileging device, one which does not privilege any preferences. This is the only solution which does not require the doing of something that is logically impossible to do (i.e identifying a priori privileged individuals). And it may be shown that such a device would need to have the characteristics of an indefinite pass initiative-and-referendum system with compulsory voting.

That is not to say that such a system would choose Democracy as the jointly preferred system of government. However, historically when people have been allowed to choose their system of government in this way they DO choose Democracy. Moreover, when they have Democracy they do not use initiative-and-referendum to abolish it even though it is a straightforward exercise to call a referendum for that purpose.

To be sure, none of this tell us what the system of government OUGHT to be, or even how the system of government OUGHT to be decided. That itself would be an is-ought fallacy ("It is logical therefore it ought to be used").

However, it does tell us how a debate (such as the one taking place here-and-now) must be conducted if it is not to degenerate into a sterile slanging match of people chanting their preferences.

To debate this issue in any other way would be like two mathematicians trying to discuss theorems, but with one of them endlessly insisting that pi "ought" to be equal to exactly 3.00. (It may easily be argued that pi "ought" to be 3.00 because OBVIOUSLY it would make all calculations much easier.) The mathematician might even bring along a gun and shoot dead anyone who suggested otherwise.

Such things are practical possibilities, but they of no use in reasoned debate. The only REASONED solution to choosing a system of government (the only solution that does involve any party endlessly insisting on unnecessarily doing something that is logically impossible to do) is to use Democracy.

Thank you for an interesting and thoughtful presentation. But as Plato reminds us, direct democracy is no panacea either. Which might lead the thoughtful to consider the need for a political infrastructure that provides "checks and balances" to moderate the problems of both the representative and direct forms of democracy.

The question here in broad terms concerns how the sovereignty of the people is to be achieved. And I think John Adams, in a slightly different context, had it right when he wrote "“It is by balancing each of these powers against the other two, that the efforts in human nature toward tyranny can alone be checked and restrained, and any degree of freedom preserved in the constitution.”

Oh boy. Firstly, can we tone down the drama queen antics? "Shock" after months of non stop talk and polls indicating the clear possibility that it could go either way? And many other editorials claiming "Tragedy", as if one had gone off and started awar under false pretenses and killed thousands and displaced millions. That did in fact happen, but we did not have 10 consecutive tear-stained editorials lamenting the horrible mistake it actually was. So lets just cut the crap. This was a no-confidence vote in the formal and informal leadership of european governments, and one that is well deserved. It may be unpleasant, but it is one of the ways democracies can course correct.

It is unfortunate that the issue had to be immigration, rather than belligirent policies which caused the immigration, but the latter were off limits for discussion, so you got what you got. Had there been a more honest dialogue between polucy makers and the public, the course correction could have happened at an earlier stage, without the unhappy anti-foreigner sentiments. But those sentiments were necessary, I recall, to justify the belligirent policies in the first place. The author knows exactly who is to blame.

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